Sonification of Virtual Space - 1Mark BradySOVS1 is an audio-visual ambient installation, mapping the activity of a "transient community" of unwitting interactors, all of whom are participating in a peer-to-peer file-sharing network. This network is the backbone of popular file sharing software such as Morpheus, LimeWire and Bareshare. Day and night music, video, images and software are freely traded between the networked peers. This network has no leader, no centre; it is an ephemeral cloud, a pool of pop consciousness. Can we touch the surface of this pool, and obtain a sense of what it's like in this abstract place?

Posing as a member of the network, this installation betrays its peers and submits for public scrutiny the flow of live queries from throughout the global network. These queries form a base, often almost pornographic and revealing essay of popular desire.

The installation employs two modes of presentation to depict this flow of desire; a simple visual display shows a sampling of the torrent of queries and provides the audience with a introduction to the audio presentation. This display is more complex multi-dimension rendering: A spatialized storm of sharp and subdued bursts of sound immerses the listener in a field of sound corresponding to every arriving query. A blurred voice chants out queries letter by letter, reflecting the fractured network data. Ever present is the deep hum of the network connection, which at times falters if our node looses its connection to another peer. When the rate of porn requests peaks the soundscape model is broken introducing a more musical layer of rhythmic sinister breath.